The Fox and The Owl
by sherlockedandloaded
Summary: Even if they survived the first time, the habit to dance with death dies hard. Post-Reichenbach. Warning: Character death.


It's all dancing and smartly dressed people and classical music. They're twirling and spinning and moving with the rhythm set by the cellos and the piano and violins. The floor gleams under their thousand dollar shoes and waiters with forced smiles bring around food in tiny portions on silver platters.

From the entryway, lavish and golden as it is, two eyes watch the other people with a cold, detached, analyzing stare. They're grey and marble-like, shining through the holes in a mask that perches over the face of a man that is nearly as tall as the entryway.

The man is dressed nicely, as every other man in the room is. There are no original characteristics about him that can be seen, save for the owl mask. But even the mask conforms to the other individuals within the ballroom.

It's a masquerade ball. This fact makes the man's work both more difficult and easier.

The entryway is left behind as the man moves diagonally along the outer-edges of the throng, keeping within the masses while still being able to move freely. He's looking over people's heads now, scanning the crowd for another man who he knows he'll find but won't be found easily.

He bumps into a couple of people, apologizes and moves on. No one recognizes that he's not supposed to be here, no one recognizes he's supposed to be dead, no one recognizes him at all. That's how he wants to keep it.

After 10 minutes, he finally spots a suit belonging to a man near the bar- Westwood, very nice, ashy grey with a pale tie; it's obviously been worn a few times, not new, but one he's seen before on a man he's been looking for. At first, he thinks it's foolish that he'd find the same suit here on the man who probably didn't want to be found but then perhaps he did want to be found.

The space between the two shrinks and shrinks, from 5 meters to 3 to 2 and finally down to 1, ½ and he stops beside the Westwood.

"Jim." The name rumbles at the back of his throat like a jaguar's growl. The single syllable reaches the air softly, slipping into the space between the two men and mixing with the classical music playing faintly from the other side of the room. There's no eye contact and none needed. There's very little you can gather about a man if his face is covered by a mask.

"Sherlock." Jim returns from behind the face of a dark fox. While his name was a growl, Sherlock's is more of a pair of wings, aloof and floating, nearly mocking. It's almost funny how indicative of their personalities a single name could be.

Silence takes its place between them, neither looking at each other. They don't need to communicate verbally in this instant; there are so many thoughts in the air that it nearly becomes telepathic. Their minds work at similar speeds, figuring out what the other would say should he have spoken.

Finally, as if on cue, Jim steps forward as the music shifts into a new classical-sounding composition that Sherlock can't quite place. The Westwood wearing fox holds out his hand, suspended in the air expectantly.

"Care for a dance, darling?" It's the same fluttery voice that makes fun without ridiculing words.

"I don't dance." A lie for what was, in all intents and purposes, an evening of lies.

"Ah, but tonight you do." Jim takes Sherlock's hand without permission, pulling him out into the center of the room. He gets very little resistance for how stubborn his partner was being.

They quickly fall into a rhythm, stepping here and then there and swaying in time. The ½ meter between them has become nothing but centimeters at most, Jim's hand on Sherlock's hip while a long arm drapes over Jim's shoulder. Any awkwardness afforded them with the height difference is all but cast away by how well they manage to move together.

"I thought you said you couldn't dance." The words graze Sherlock's ear.

Sherlock steps on Jim's left foot, making sure to hit pointedly with his heel.

Jim is seemingly unfazed, but starts to favor his right foot more as they continue swaying. Sherlock's lips quirk up behind his mask and it's a shame the other man can't see the self-gratifying smirk he has on his face.

As the music continues to play, the two dance in relative silence. They move forward and to the side and Sherlock starts to get lost in the dancing. He's here for a purpose but now that purpose is blurred because of all things, he didn't expect to be dancing with this man tonight. In some way, he wishes he'd seen it coming. That's what he's good at isn't it? Figuring things out that others can't. Not with him.

"There's a bomb." Jim says it so softly, so lightly against Sherlock's ear he very nearly misses it.

"I know." They make a turn and Jim's hand on Sherlock's hip tightens a fraction.

"Smart boy." Sherlock hears the smile even if he doesn't see it. "But does the smart boy know where the bomb is?"

Sherlock doesn't admit he doesn't know, he doesn't admit anything. He stays silent and that's admission enough.

Jim tuts. "You love to disappoint me, don't you Sherlock?" He punctuated his question with dance steps. "Well, if you don't know now, I'd suggest you figure it out before this place goes 'kaboom!' hmm?"

Sherlock stares down at Jim coldly before allowing his eyes freedom to move elsewhere, searching the room for possible places to hold a bomb. In such a room there's a plethora of possibilities, difficult to narrow in on. It could be planted on a person or placed under a tile of the grand floor, waiting for someone to step on it like a mine; it could be anywhere.

Jim chuckles. "Oh the owl, how he thinks himself _clever._" The two spin, making Sherlock's train of thought teeter on the tracks, threatening to tip over and crash. He needs to focus but the devil in his ear won't stop.

"Of course you won't find it. You'll disappoint me again, I know you will." The words are injected into his ear like a poison that he tries to ignore but infects him slowly, from within.

Sherlock has to think, he has to concentrate or he'll be dead in the water. Where would Jim Moriarty hide a bomb? Nowhere obvious. It has to be someplace clever, Jim likes games and games are no fun when they're easy. Where then? It could be in the vents but that isn't very clever. Planting it on a person is a possibility except for the fact that Moriarty has supposedly been dead for two and a half years now and webs are hard to reweave after being spider-less for so long. Then _where_?

"Oh, poor Sherly. You look so confused. Have I really stumped you this time?" Jim moves in, his lips so close to Sherlock's ear that he could almost feel them brush against the shell.

"Do you want a hint?"

Sherlock takes careful, deliberate breaths to keep his heart rate under control. He's not going to seem at a disadvantage, not to Jim. There's no response to Jim's question, Sherlock merely looks straight ahead, impassively watching other dancers around them.

"Take my pulse."

Sherlock is a little confused by the demand, but he doesn't question it, moving his hand to Jim's wrist. The only problem is that he runs into a watch that can't be moved in order to reach the wrist underneath it to take the pulse. It's a new watch, probably a Rolex by the feel of it, a couple notches too tight for the wrist it's-

_Oh._

Sherlock tugs at the wristwatch with sudden fervor, wanting, needing to get it off. The watch, it's… How did he not know? Has two years of trying to find this man taken such a toll?

Jim laughs. "You've finally caught on. I had my doubts there for a moment." Sherlock gives up on tugging, that obviously isn't going to work. A new plan has to be formed now, as they fall back into the dance.

Sherlock suddenly becomes acutely aware of the other people. There are so many of them, including himself and the bomb he's dancing with. They'll all die, if Jim has his way.

"You evade death only to welcome him with open arms." Sherlock comments, still occasionally letting his fingers brush lower over the metallic watch. He does it almost subconsciously, without thinking much of it or having any deliberate purpose for it.

"It's a more fitting end."

"When?"

"Soon."

They dance and Sherlock feels as though these might just be his last steps, the last sounds he'll hear will be violins, and the last sight he sees will be the fox. Somehow, he thinks, maybe this would be the right way for it to end. Everyone else already believes he's dead.

But Sherlock doesn't want to go out with so many people around. It's the only condition he dislikes. It's the flaming dessert of a freckled waiter that provides the need for evacuation. It catches fire on one of the white tablecloths.

"FIRE!" Sherlock yells and soon the room is in a panic. Jim looks less than happy but makes no move to prevent any of this. He's annoyed but not necessarily upset. The people are gone within minutes and the music stops playing. The fire is small but slowly growing. Sherlock puts it out with his shoe.

"There. Better."

"Hardly." Jim states dryly, steering them through the dance as though there's still cellos in the background. In his mind there very well might be.

It's in the last few moments that everything slows down. Sherlock's world is focused in on the simplicity of this dance, the 1-2-3 and smoothness of their steps in time with a ghost rhythm that plays in the pair's heads. The flashing of the dark eyes behind the fox mask and the grey suit swaying in front of him; this is the universe and the world and everything there is. This moment is everything and nothing, the defining moment of the entire history of the world.

There's no telling when the clock will run out, but until then, they dance. Until that moment when it stops, they move together, no matter if it happens in 2 minutes or 2 years.

Sherlock reaches out and lifts the fox off of Jim's face. It's an impulse, an urge, to see the face of the man that will be the death of him once and for all. Jim does the same to the owl and the two masks hit the floor. Now they're no longer hiding.

"Goodbye Sherlock Holmes, such a great game we played."

"Goodbye Jim."

Sherlock barely hears the explosion ring in his ears as the world crumbles into nothingness.


End file.
